Pulchra
by I Am SomeoneI Am No One
Summary: It was utterly ridiculous. An ugly creature like me, tell the most beautiful bird alive that I loved him? No... it simply wouldn't do. It was a hopeless dream... one, for some reason, I refused to ever give up. Legendaryshipping, Lugia/Ho-oh, male/male


**meh, it's been a while since I've posted anything. I received SoulSilver on Tuesday and have been playing it since, and after I watched my sister with HeartGold I was like '....Lugia always get the short end of the stick! DX' which I firmly believe lol. XD I wrote this in the car on the way back from Ft. Worth, with my battery running on the last shreds of power. so I'm sorry if this is all icky and stuff, but I really wanted to get it out DX**

**'Pulchra' means beautiful.**

:-:

Ho-oh and I were really quite the same in some features. We were both Legendaries, majestic birds, lords of those who fly and run as if they had wings. We both were lords of trios, consisting of those of fire, electricity, and, to some degree, ice and water. We both had our respective homes. We were both respected and revered by the people.

It's just that I was always made out as a being of fear. I was spoken of only rarely. He was the one the people wanted.

Not I.

I am the 'beast of the sea', simply put. As for Ho-oh, he was the 'majestic bird of the skies'. The Kimono Ladies of Ecruteak, possessors of the Clear and Tidal Bells, always tried to find young Trainers of purest hearts to summon Ho-oh back to them. As for me, I slept almost forgotten in the waterfall basin of the dangerous Whirl Islands. My altar collected nothing but sea water and barnacles, the golden bells on the holy rocks slowly rusting.

Once or twice did I ever recieve a Trainer summon from the Kimono Ladies, and every single time, I destroyed them. Was it always the bad Trainers that searched for me? But then I had to remember the same was for Ho-oh... the beautiful, elegant Ho-oh.

He was beautiful, the bringer of rainbows and grace. He had full feathered wings of shimmering gold, white and green, a pure plethora of rainbow colors. The Legendary possessed a sleek, small, swan-like body, long legs of a bird, talons of steel, a long, golden beak, and plumage of gold. His cries were short and sounded like a bell chime, and with every flap of his wings, happiness seemed to rain down. He was a guardian spirit of the people, of his trio of Legendary majestic beasts, Entei, Raikou and Suicune, and his tears could revieve the dead.

I, on the other hand, was ugly... at least in my own eyes. My feathers were not long and beautiful, a simple, solid color like the snow. They shimmered only from ice water. My wings were not pretty; rather, they looked almost like strange, squared hands. I had strange legs, nothing like a bird's, and the large feathers on my back, which helped me streamline through the heavy ocean currents, deep under the ocean, were odd. I was a giant compared to the other bird Legendaries, and I was bulky, not sleek and elegant like he was. My cries were long, powerful, and terrifying. I guarded the sea, my islands, my beautiful trio of birds, Zapdos, Moltres, and Articuno, and with a flap of my wings, I could very easily wipe out a sea-side town just from the wind it would generate.

It was even the same in our human forms. He was still as dazzling and stunning as ever. He was still small and elegant, while I was still giant. I was still ugly.

I hated him. He was perfect in every way, and I envied him for that.

He was always the one that was wanted; not I. He could bring happiness; not I. He could bring peace; I brought destruction. He was beautiful... I was not.

But all at the same time, I loved him deeply and desperately. I wanted to give him happiness... I wanted to kiss him over and over again, and tell him that I loved him... and show him just how much I did.

It was utterly ridiculous. An ugly creature like me, tell the most beautiful bird alive that I loved him?

No... it simply wouldn't do.

It was a hopeless dream... one, for some reason, I refused to ever give up.

No matter how much I wished my feelings away, dashed them as they surfaced, they still lingered. I thought that maybe with my death back in 2000, as I sank lower and lower into the ocean, my home, my beautiful home, I could finally forget these feelings... even when I was brought back through the power of the girl Melody's flute, the song of rebirth and reformation, there they were. It drove me utterly mad, so much to the point that even our God, Arceus, himself decended down to see just what on earth was hurting me so.

And when I told him, he simply chuckled, shook his head, and left. If Arceus had no hope of my love, then I had no idea how I could still have hope.

But still, I did. And I suffered with these feelings for many millenia, starting even before humans populated Sinnoh... and never ending.

:-:

I remembered the last time I saw him; It was right after the revial of the Legendary dog trio after the burning of Tin Tower, in 1982. He looked very tired, his crimson eyes bloodshot, his feathers smeared and singed from the flames of the fire. He smelled of smoke, tears, fire, lightning and rainwater. And he was still as beautiful as ever.

"I am going away, Lugia," He told me after he and his trio had bathed themselves of the flame's marks and the signs of death in my waterfall basin. "I would suggest you go into hiding here at the Whirl Islands too.

...I am tired, Lugia.

Tired of all these bad humans trying to control us... I will come back the day a human with the purest heart summons me at the Bell Tower with the Clear Bell and the newest Kimono Ladies. Lugia... please, please go into hiding. I don't want the humans to come after you too."

Those words struck a heavy chord in me, but I knew that he was only looking after my best interests since I was his fellow counterpart. Nothing more, nothing less... and when he and the dogs left, I retreated into the deepest parts of the waterfall basin, giving a couple of simple orders to my birds to hide at the Orange Islands... and there I stayed for years and years. Rarely did I leave. I only came on the nights of huge storms, to try and reduce as much damage as possible... although I think I only made it worse.

Sometimes I couldn't stop the tears. Sometimes I couldn't help but throw my head to the moonlit sky and scream, "Come back to me!! I love you, Ho-oh, come back to me! Please...!"

My pleas fell only on the sound of the churning sea... and I knew I could never actually say those words to Ho-oh. Never...

:-:

One day, he did come back.

I could feel his presence returning to the continent... it was almost like energy of the sun itself. I wanted to rush out of Whirl Islands, fly my way all the way to Ecruteak, just to see him, if only for a moment... but I simply transformed into my human form and left the Whirl Islands to walk on the shores of Cainwood, to control myself, to better grasp onto my feelings. I couldn't just go out and tell I loved him... I couldn't. And I told that to myself many, many times as I walked in the shallows of the sea. No one could see me where I was; something I prefered.

To my utmost shock and surprise, I saw Ho-oh.

There he was, walking in the shallows of the ocean as well in his human form, almost as if searching for something. I swear my heart stopped the moment I saw him, he was just that beautiful. Had he gotten even more stunning while he was gone? Once my heart realized that it wasn't dreaming, it steadily pumped at the front of my chest... it would not calm, no matter how many times I wished it to.

But I noticed something about the guardian spirit's face... he was not happy. In fact, he looked upset... almost sad. His eyes were a tangle of intangible emotions, ranging from anger, denile, and utter sadness... I wanted to just run to him, take him into my arms, and say that everything would be okay, even if I had no idea why he was so upset in the first place... but I restained myself. Instead, I let my voice call out, "Ho-oh? Is that you?"

He looked up at me, and his face just instantly changed. The unhappy look on his face simply melted, reforming into one of pure happiness. "Lugia!" He called back to me, running through the gentle waves and coming to me, embracing me deeply. I stiffened up; he had never done anything like this before. He didn't seem to notice, though, and he pulled back and looked me in the eyes, a wide smile on his lips. "Oh, Lugia, how happy I am to see you! It's been so long...! How have you been? What's happened to this continent?"

And so, I told him. I believe we stood there for almost a solid hour as I told him everything I had learned while I was in the Whirl Islands. As he listened, his face changed quite a lot, but I never could pinpoint how he was feeling before his face changed again. After I was finished, he nodded and smiled at me, at which point I think my heart decided to leap up into my throat. I forced it back down and managed to utter, "What have you done while you were away?"

He smiled again and began his tale. It stretched farther into the night, and I listened to every single word, not entirely for the tale, but for his voice... As he kept going, those cursed feelings rose in my heart again, threatening to choke me alive. My hands clenched at the hem of my jacket, and still I forced myself to listen, trying to dash away the feelings, just for now, before I lost it, but no avail.

And suddenly, I could take no more. I let out a cry, a long, painful scream, and buried my head in my hands. I could feel hot tears starting to sting at my palms, and I quickly turned away from Ho-oh, the beautiful man I was so deeply and desperately in love with, to the ocean. My shoulders were shaking... but aside from the cry I had let go of just a couple of moments eariler, I was dead silent.

Despair starting to build in my stomach...

I heard Ho-oh approach, and felt him gently lay his hand on my shoulder. "Lugia...? Why do you hurt so?" Those words stung me like a Beedrill sting. The beautiful, majestic Ho-oh was truely asking me why I was hurting... asking an ugly creature like me such a question.

I don't entirely know what made me snap, but I am assuming it was that question. All at once, a dam within me broke... words starting to spill out of my mouth like a free-flowing waterfall. "Why do I hurt? Why? You ask me that, and yet I am almost afraid to answer. I don't understand it, Ho-oh... how can you care about a creature like me? I am ugly, and you are beautiful... you bring people happiness, and yet I destroy. I don't want to hurt you... but I am right now. I am a creature unworthy of love, but still I feel it running through my veins and driving me absolutely mad. I feel for you like no other, but I am ugly... ugly creatures cannot love beautiful ones. It's just not right.

Do you know now why I hurt so, Ho-oh...? I love you. But you do not love me back, I know this. It would be wrong... and I am a creature unworthy of your love anyways."

Silence. Dead silence. The despair in my belly started to consume me, the desperateness in my heart starting to die. I felt almost cold, numb... almost dead. My hands fell away from my face, and I let my tears fall freely into the salty ocean then... what was the point of hiding them anymore? "Scorn me and hate me all you please. I don't care."

I suddenly felt myself whirled around, a hard slap on my cheek. Ho-oh looked almost furious... it would have been much more convincing if tears hadn't been streaking down his face. I raised a hand to my cheek, absolutely confounded... then he started to speak. "You know nothing. You dare suggest for me to scorn and hate you...?"

Then, his arms were around me, taking me into an embrace. "I could never do those things, even if I wanted to...! Why do you speak so harshly of yourself, Lugia? I am not beautiful; I only am beautiful in the eyes of others. I don't think I am beautiful." He looked up at me, into my eyes... and this time, I could make out most of the emotions in his eyes. I then knew what it felt like to drown. "No, I am not. There is one other, though... one of silver and navy. He is beautiful beyond all compare... the most elegant creature to ever set foot on this planet. Every single part of him is gorgeous. And I feel very strongly for this person. I thought he would for surely scorn me, and turn me away..."

There were tears streaking down his face again.

"I felt like I was unworthy of his love." One of his hands reached up and cradled my own tear-streaked cheek, drawing his face closer to mine. "How long have you suffered, Lugia...?"

I swallowed. "....Millenia."

"So have I. I have suffered from this unrequited love forever..." His lips were tantilizingly close to mine. I felt like I was going to go absolutely insane. Was he telling me...?

"I love you, Lugia. I always have. You are not ugly... you are beautiful."

He pressed our lips together.


End file.
